Reported statment

Question

What is the "reported statement" and how does it differ from the statement?

CalifJim · Accepted Answer

AnonymousWhat is the "reported statement" and how does it differ from the statement?

Have you looked up the verb 'report' in a dictionary? You should probably start there.

CJ

Anonymous · Answer

CalifJim AnonymousWhat is the "reported statement" and how does it differ from the statement?Have you looked up the verb 'report' in a dictionary? You should probably start there.CJ

Thanks for the reply. I've just come across such a sentence in a grammar book: "Just as that noun clauses often have a role of indirect or reported statement..." The authors send the reader to other part of the book to explain it but somehow I couldn't get it.

CalifJim · Answer

AnonymousThe authors send the reader to other part of the book to explain it

What did it say there?

CJ

Anonymous · Answer

CalifJim AnonymousThe authors send the reader to other part of the book to explain itWhat did it say there?CJ

They do not directly refer to the term "reported statement", but there is such a passage there:

"This brings us to a set of grammatical choices which are intimately connected with narrative point of view:

(a) 'Are we never to meet?' he said.
(b) He asked her if they were never to meet.
(c) Were they never meet?

The version which gives speech in quotation marks, (a),supplies the actual words supposedly spoken by character. This is called DIRECT SPEECH, in contrast to the construction with the subordinate clause (b), which is called INDIRECT SPEECH. A third possibility for reporting the speech of a character is that of (c), known as FREE INDIRECT SPEECH. Here the main reporting clause is omitted, but the pronouns and tenses are those which are appropriate for indirect speech (b)." (English Grammar for Today.)

I've got some problem with understanding this: "Here the main reporting clause is omitted, but the pronouns and tenses are those which are appropriate for indirect speech (b)."

CalifJim · Answer

AnonymousI've got some problem with understanding this

Really? It's not that complicated.

Anonymousthe main reporting clause is omitted

There is no "He asked her if".

Anonymousthe pronouns and tenses are those which are appropriate for indirect speech (b).

The pronoun in (b) is "they". The pronoun in (c) is also "they".
The tense in (b) is past (were). The tense in (c) is also past (were).
________

That's all there is to it.

CJ

Anonymous · Answer

Thanks for the clarification. Indeed, it's not so complicated now. The problem I had was mostly with that omission of the reporting clause in the "reported statement(question)" (c), i.e. how come that we name a clause a "reported statement" (c) without a reporting clause introducing it.

CalifJim · Answer

Anonymoushow come that we name a clause a "reported statement" (c) without a reporting clause introducing it.

It is the statement that is being reported. Therefore it is a "reported statement". Besides, whether you like it or not, that's the terminology that your book uses.

CJ

Reported statment

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